7.30.2011

Well, you may have noticed that we've been pretty quiet on the blog front this summer. It's not because we haven't done anything noteworthy, it's mostly because we're too exhausted to retell anything that's been going on.

The summer started with the kids both coming in first in their divisions at a soccer tournament. Complete with trophies, rain, soccer drama and everything. I'd like to know where my “Wait 6 hours for a rain delay... I mean rain cancellation” -trophy is, but hey, I'm not bitter.

This has been an action-packed, cinematic season for Habtamu. Through luck, general resourcefulness, and charity, he has found his way into Thor 3D, X-Men, Green Lantern 3D, Transformers 3D, Harry Potter 3D and possibly Kung Fu Panda2 but that was so many movies ago I can't remember. Captain America and Cowboys vs. Aliens would get him through July. I keep telling him that “this isn't normal” and that he shouldn't expect to spend every summer in the theater. He keeps looking at me like the hero waiting for a monologing villian to shut up.

H's other big event this summer is that he really wanted an iTouch before we left for camp in late July. He wanted it for the 10 hour car ride, and was willing to mow a lot of lawns to get it. Well, he beat his own expectations and picked up a glorious 8Gb iTouch in June which gave him plenty of time to pine for a NintendoDS before we actually left for vacation. More on the reason for that stint of jealousy is in the next paragraph. The learning curve of such “intuitive technology” for a boy who reads at a 3rd grade level and his father who would much rather be blowing out Atari cartridges, has been steep but suffice it to say that not tying my credit card to his Apple account was my best financial decision this year. (You can set everything up with just gift cards but it's tricky. Apple reeeeally wants your cc.) The 'Buy' button is easy enough for him to avoid when it's not popping up mid-game, however 'Confirm Purchase' is just a little too long to bother reading and it's much easier just to push it and see what happens. Fortunately since he doesn't keep much more than 10 dollars in his account, the damages have been contained to one mispurchased Coby Calaye (?) album. Considering the boy pounds on that 'entertainment device' like crazed monkey, I'm calling that a win.

Yordanos generally isn't as gadget-driven as Habtamu, but she did lay down the cash for a NintendoDS a week ago. She then learned the hard way that the DS does not come with any games, which stinks under normal circumstances, but is a really tough lesson to learn when you've drain your savings account just to get the DS in the first place. Not surprisingly though, Yo socially engineered (ie charmed) a fistfull of games from a friend. That makes a lot more sense to me than spending 99 cents a pop, but I'm old school that way.

Yoyo also bought herself a BIKE at the beginning of June. Chris and I both approved of that purchase and she has shared her joy with the rest of the neighborhood, smiling and making housecalls to everyone she finds.